The Blog Page for Northwest Arkansas Atheists

Morning Meditations #104: This is Rance

I found this along with a picture the other day. I wanted to publish it before I release it to fire. It is times like this when it’s the hardest.

This is Rance

1. Your devotion to and love for Ivy

2. that you been knocked down so many times and you still get back up (you perseverance)

3. you genuine, head-thrown back laugh

4. the way you look when you play drums

5. the way you sound when you play drums

6. how strong you can be, even when you are in pain

7. you fervor for TED Talks

8. the you care for and invest into Anthony

9. the way you have cared for Brady

10. the way in which you cared for me in some of my lowest moments

11. Papa Bear

12. your love of words/language

13. your use of mowing the lawn as a contemplative act

14. the perseverance required to keep doing physical therapy, especially when you had stopped for several weeks

15. your ability to cry, feel emotions so deeply

16. your loyalty to your friendships

17. your desire to help others

18. your choice to seek professional help

19. your love of cooking/smoothie making

20. your thirst for knowledge

21. magic coffee

22. many of the ways you choose to raise Ivy, which are innovative and have her best interest at heart

23. you patience

24. the way you strive to bring into/create your life, the things you want

25. your innovative constructions of makeshift furniture

26. your flexibility with others’ preferences

27. the strength it took to quit smoking, and stay quit

28. your openness to a new level of relationship with your father

29. your ongoing internal soundtrack

30. your dedication to therapy/health

I have wanted to do this all day. Clutching the hard copy of this, I hadn’t expected to see it, and now, I don’t want to let it go. I remember when this list had been composed, when I read it aloud, around eleven months ago. While I haven’t held up to everything on this list, and I don’t think I deserve some of the praise. It revealed how I could be seen by someone if you took out all the bad stuff, a pretty picture I suppose. Although, I still prefer the real one.

The whole picture, which includes this list, is one of many negative factors. Wall punching rage that would have to fade for me to come home to myself. The intense jealousy when she started seeing someone else revealed a deep devotion once accepted. The feeling of intense loneliness I felt upon finding the picture of her, Ivy, and I, and the evidence of understanding in knowing two items cannot stay here. She’ll never be an object of desire in my life, and the time the picture represented is drifting further and further away. She is a whole and amazing person, the one I chose, for better or for worse.